The Pacific, 1942: They were young men, a year removed from their stateside fraternity houses and university lecture halls. 

Charles "Red" Kendrick spent his 16th birthday in the shadow of Stanford’s Hoover Tower, a child prodigy fluent in seven languages. Before he moved on to Harvard, he pledged Sigma Nu. 

Delta Tau at Miami University counted lean-faced Yale Kaufman among its brothers. Yale also played football and track at the school. 

Dick Mangrum, the oldest and wisest of them, had been in Phi Delta Phi at the University of Washington before he went on to law school, and a decade-long flying career.